Barby Asante Celebrates Black Workers on London Underground

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An iteration of London artist Barby Asante’s Declaration of Independence will be performed at Stratford Tube Station from 2pm on 17 September.

The performance and accompanying visual artworks are part of Asante’s commission for the Art on the Underground scheme run by Transport for London (TfL).

Visitors to the station will hear a chorus of voices singing a ‘declaration of independence’ that includes personal narratives of black diaspora women and non-binary people who worked on or for the London Underground.

The script has been developed during a series of workshops with TfL workers, and in collaboration with artists Hannah Catherine Jones, Baby Blue, and Innavisions; psychotherapist Foluke Taylor; and sociologist Gail Lewis.

‘By telling our stories, and sharing experiences through performance, the work explores the potential to question existing dominant narratives, reflecting on how the political affects the personal,’ Asante said.

As part of the commission, Asante spent time looking through the London Transport Museum’s photography archives to select images of women of colour at work throughout TfL’s history.

These included promotional images used by London Transport for recruitment in Barbados in 1956, providing an enriched understanding of diasporic migrant histories.

Another image that caught the artist’s eye is a ‘Fluffer’ cleaning the track in the tunnels at night— a role which was predominantly done by women but is now done by machines.

These found images will be incorporated into a series of large-scale vinyl works that will be installed at Stratford, Bethnal Green, and Notting Hill Green stations.

Art on the Underground has already engaged artists including Yayoi Kusama, Zadie Xa, Mark Wallinger, and Monster Chetwynd to create works throughout London’s newest tube-rail network. —[O]

Main image: Barby Asante, Declaration of Independence (2023) Poster. Stratford Tube Station. Photo: Benedict Johnson.